The thing people need to realize about .50 is that it's NOT meant to be .68. The thought process behind .50 wasn't "Hey! Let's make a round that effectively goes a shorter range!", the thought process was "Hey! Let's make a round that hurts less!".

The main argument I see about .50 is the lack of range. You wanna go play in Germany where the FPS limit is 214 feet per second and *****? The only other argument other than "Well it sucks /thread" is the size of the paint markings. It's not like .50 paint fill has different mechanics than .68 fill, it's just a smaller quantity, so how refs would normally look for a hit would still be the exact same.

Otherwise, I just see the main complaints being about how it's not widely implemented which is really only caused by people viewing it as having to replace .68 caliber.

Personally, I see a TON of opportunities.

For a front player, you can fit more rounds in less pods. In the woods your distance is already limited so you can carry more paint per pod meaning more paint with you. Personally, my favorite time playing EVER was playing 6 man on a field that was roughly 60 feet wide by 90 feet long and .50 cal would fit that field size perfectly. Then the MOST helpful situation it could be is trying to get that kid who sits in the back laning to play more aggressive. Having less distance means he has to move up the field and work on his gunfighting skills.

Most of the .50 cal hate stemmed from the fact that the original marketing tried to say that .50 cal was better than 68 cal and implied it would eventually replace 68 cal. It was more a marketing blunder than anything else. People felt like someone was trying to force it down their throats.

I dont need a higher capacity, I dont even use a pod when i play, so that argument doesnt work for me. Also if it is down to just that kid laning in the back on the other team I well almost always get them, you know why? because they dont move, so most people i play are always moving so that argument doesnt work either. Also the less painful round i couldnt care less about. .68 cal really doesnt even hurt. However with all this being said, i feel like trying .50 cal would be fun to see what its like, i just dont have the money right now to try it.

I dont need a higher capacity, I dont even use a pod when i play, so that argument doesnt work for me.

Well, good for you, the argument doesn't apply to you because you shoot a hopper every game (if that), but that's like saying that having a hopper doesn't apply to me because I play a stock class feed in a game. Just because it doesn't matter for you doesn't mean it doesn't matter for someone else.

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Also if it is down to just that kid laning in the back on the other team I well almost always get them, you know why? because they dont move, so most people i play are always moving so that argument doesnt work either.

I don't think you get the argument. It's not for if it's down to that kid laning at the end of the game, it's about getting that kid into the habit of playing aggressively. If you're at a practice and you practice .50 on a regular field, playing aggressively will be that much more habitual.

Had you payed attention to what I was saying, .50 would work to get that kid to move around more and quit sitting in the back (which was my point that went over the top of your head).

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Also the less painful round i couldnt care less about. .68 cal really doesnt even hurt.

Again, good for you. Now, go tell that to the 9 year old who is trying paintball for the first time.

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However with all this being said, i feel like trying .50 cal would be fun to see what its like, i just dont have the money right now to try it.

.50 is definitely a change of pace from standard .68. I've tried it with a Spyder and it's definitely a different feel of the game. You have much less range, if you're already aggressive you won't notice it, but if you sit in the back you'll definitely wish you didn't.

I'm almost tempted to pick up some cheap Spyders and make my entire team use them during practice just to get into the habit of being aggressive which is the biggest opportunity I see.

__________________
You may call it fat, I call it bounce padding.
EΔRL
I'm a huge B///MW fan

Hey, if .50 will stop the rampant spray and pray that is prevalent in the sport today thanks to the invent of "ramping", I'm all behind it.

Unfortunately, it will only increase the amount of ramping douchebaggery and drive more players away because the people using .50 markers can fit more rounds into a hopper and into a pod and just send more of it into the air in the desperate hopes of hitting something, instead of growing a set, learning to move and get IN to the game. Every single video I've seen of someone playing with .50 is just another ramping ******* who can now sit there and spray and pray for even longer because he can carry more paint. If there was any reason to hate it, there it is.

But since it costs more - and yes, it currently costs more only because it's new - and has a serious lack of desirable markers and no desirable loaders, you're going to get far less penetration into an already small and contracting market. While that's not necessarily a valid reason to talk **** and hate on .50, it's a reason and that's all the internet needs is one small little reason. Valid or not.

.50 paint sucks, lets just call a spade a spade and not beat around the bush. There is no good .50 paint on the market at all and companies aren't going to invest in brand new, very expensive encapsulation machines if they don't see a demand. They won't see a demand if they don't improve quality. It's the whole chicken and the egg thing. With the paint that is available being such crap and not wanting to break on an impact, you'll see more players turned off by it because they have to overshoot (something which a good player will never want to do), and they'll get overshot way more just to get paint to break. Getting pelted with little .50 rocks is no fun; getting pelted with .68 paint that breaks isn't any fun either, but at least the paint breaks and you have an excuse to hunt down the ****head that lit you up and give him a piece of your mind.

Whether .50 hurts any less than .68 is comparing apples and oranges. Some people say it hurts the same, some say it hurts less. I say they hurt about equally, which is to say, for the most part unless it's point blank, it doesn't hurt much. I say paintball is a sport where you're shooting at somebody and running through a hazardous field of play. Adrenalin is pumping, you're moving and grooving. Any minor discomfort (because really, would anyone say getting hut HURTS, or just uncomfortable?) of getting hit by a paintball is trumped by the fact that you got shot out of the game.

I do, however, absolutely agree with the assessment that .50 might be a nice alternative for realistic MILSIM markers that use magazines instead of hoppers. I sure wouldn't mind an SMG with a mag that holds 50 paintballs.

I think if we as a community of paintballers started kicking everyone we saw using ramping square in the nuts, far fewer stupid people will be born in the future, and you'd see more players come back to the sport after they figure out that little Timmy with the thousand dollar Luxe, Ion, Ego, etc... that mommy and daddy bought won't be shooting full auto all the time and won't send two dozen balls down range with little more than a firing of a single, half-dead brain cell and a twitch of a finger. At that point, .50 wouldn't matter.

Just bought my first NEW HIGH END and I am not looking to covert it to .50 ( it was $$$$$ enough )

I DISAGREE WITH ONLY THE LAST "ramping"

IMO it levels the playing field against FAST FINGERS. Instead of 1 guy clearing the field the marker helps each player equally. Rate of fire can be an issue (normally a Newb gets over shoot) and they never come back. SOLUTION: Limit hoppers to shake and bake only. NO ROTOR= SLOWER FEED RATE=SLOWER RATE OF FIRE.

Also, anybody who ever wants to practice for or play in a tournament is going to want a tournament marker, not a 50 cal marker

If you practice with .50, it forces you to work on specific skills, then, when you play the tournament with .68 you'll have the advantage of that aggressive play that was forced by .50.

Besides, ramping will always be ramping. If a kid wants to unload with uncapped ramping he'll do it with .68 just as quickly as he'd do it with .50, but at least .50 has the advantage if someone gets overshot.

Huh, the 1000 round box from Wal-Mart and half of a 50 round grenade from another Wal-Mart were all like that and they were roughly one month apart in purchase. The shells are nice and brittle, but they weren't shooting super straight.

__________________
You may call it fat, I call it bounce padding.
EΔRL
I'm a huge B///MW fan

Huh, the 1000 round box from Wal-Mart and half of a 50 round grenade from another Wal-Mart were all like that and they were roughly one month apart in purchase. The shells are nice and brittle, but they weren't shooting super straight.

More specifically, I bought the advertised paint at Wal-Mart less than a month after the JT line was released and saw it. I've commonly seen it on mid-grade RPS paint so I assumed it was a common defect (or at least around here).

__________________
You may call it fat, I call it bounce padding.
EΔRL
I'm a huge B///MW fan

I dont need a higher capacity, I dont even use a pod when i play, so that argument doesnt work for me. Also if it is down to just that kid laning in the back on the other team I well almost always get them, you know why? because they dont move, so most people i play are always moving so that argument doesnt work either. Also the less painful round i couldnt care less about. .68 cal really doesnt even hurt. However with all this being said, i feel like trying .50 cal would be fun to see what its like, i just dont have the money right now to try it.

You are an ignorant SOB man. U can't look past the fact that not everyone thinks that paint is not too expensive. Not everyone can get paint for less than $30 a case and for those people it's cheap. Some people actually play tourneys and shoot 4-6 pods a game... Some people aren't wasting life playing recball. And the thing I laughed most about was you saying paintball doesn't hurt. I agree I have been playing tourneys for 5 years and I don't think it hurts but when I first started I thought it did and everyone does at some point. You are one arrogant *** bro you are treating it like you are the center of the paintball world. People in certain situations can utilize 50 cal just because you can't doesn't mean it's worthless.

Personally I can't utilize it either but I got it to try and I can really see a market for it

There may be a market for this... The problem is market share and following. Everybody knows paintball is struggling, and 50 cal is just another avenue to spend your PB dollars. Right now woods ball, rec, pump, and tournament all use 68 cal. Many have that tricked out Milsim marker for that cool look in scenario and other woods ball games. Speed ball markers are in their gear bags, too. Oh yeah then there's the pump to work on the skills.

Why not a 50 cal? I'll tell you why because I am already broke.

50 cal was heralded as PB's savior. It was supposed to replace 68 cal (cheaper, more in hopper, etc). It didn't get the following....

I'm not going to lie. The JT Splatmaster is pretty cool, but 20 feet away and I'm at 100% bounces with the KEE paint. 2 bounces off of my lens, 1 off of my kneecap, 2 off of my shoulder, and 2 off of my body (those weren't surprising). If it breaks, it hurts less, but if it doesn't break it hurts like when a cheap .68 ball does.

With GI paint the Splatmaster works just fine, but it's going to pull in more kids for outlaw ball than anything else.

__________________
You may call it fat, I call it bounce padding.
EΔRL
I'm a huge B///MW fan